Tiny Devotional for Tuesday, 09-13-2022

A great good morning to all my friends and neighbors in Internet Land! And to family members who have dropped by, pimento cheese on a croissant, because we don’t have any pork rinds.

The soul of the sluggard craves and gets nothing,
But the soul of the diligent is made fat.
Proverbs 13:4, NASB

Feeding soul AND body
Bogo City, Philippines

Note that this isn’t talking about the BODY of the sluggard and the diligent. Maybe that’s because the sluggard’s body IS getting fat: No exercise, you see, because they don’t work, and are Couch Potatoes. If this is the truth brought to us, then we have physical cause (no exertion), linked to spiritual consequence (‘skinny’ soul).

Consider this: 2700 years ago, when these Proverbs were recorded, there was a LOT more physical work involved in getting fed than there is today. Personally, hard physical work usually results in deep thinking. If that’s universal, maybe that’s how the diligent/hard workers fattened their souls. 

But, diligence in sweaty muscle work can’t be the ONLY mechanism to produce satisfied souls.  
My personal and professional experience is that the lack of diligence in relationships produces the greatest starvation of the soul. 
I don’t know what my experience would be in another part of the world, but because I’m planted here, that’s what I see. All relationships require WORK: family, friends, co-workers. A person who refuses to put the effort in their relationships is a sluggard; they WANT things to be good, but they get nothing.

As I’m writing this, I’m mindful that nourishing the soul is difficult when the body is hungry. We don’t HAVE to choose to feed EITHER soul OR body; we can feed both! That’s what Kemuel and Ching Montecalvo do in the Philippines. JOIN THEM! 

Peace be on your household.

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